Second Sunday in Advent 2009
Our Advent II Gospel is a real mind twister if we don’t have a saving and reassuring belief based upon Holy Scripture. Our Lord spells it out in stark clarity. There is no analogy or exquisite symbolism … He tells it like it is and will be. It is a dramatic and frightening account of the ruination of the world - the end of the world as we know it:
“Jesus said unto his disciples, There shall be signs in the sun, and in the moon, and in the stars; and upon the earth distress of nations, with perplexity, the sea and the waves roaring; men’s hearts failing them for fear, and for looking after those things which are coming on the earth: for the powers of heaven shall be shaken.”
And according to this Gospel, it is in the very devastation of the world, in the destruction of all worldly hopes and expectations, that our salvation appears to us:
“And when these things begin to come to pass, then look up, and lift up your heads, for your redemption draweth nigh.”
This is God’s paradoxical irony in the boldest terms. When things look their worst, the very best is about to happen. This speech of Jesus’ is generally interpreted as a prophecy about the future, about the end of time. It is … but it is also about our present time. It is His commentary on the world in which we live, and about the way in which we live in it, here and now. It is a relevant and devastating criticism of our own worldliness, our worldly hopes and expectations. And it is also filled with joyous hope.
The point is this: For all of us, and for each one of us individually, this world, and the things of this world must pass away, not just in some vague, remote and unimaginable future, but right now. They are passing things; that is their very nature. They are passing things, and they are passing away even as we grasp them in our hands. No cleverness, no wishful thinking, no advanced technology can make them anything other than transitory things. It is foolishness to set our hearts upon them. In fact, we are just passing through. Our Advent hope is an other-worldly hope. It looks towards a Savior who spurns worldly power, and desires no worldly recommendation of any sort. Our Advent hope finds in the poor and helpless Infant of Bethlehem the eternal Word of God. It is a hope that contradicts worldly hopes and expectations. The heavens and the earth pass away, they are passing away at every moment, but the Word of God, the Logos, Our Lord and Saviour Jesus Christ does not pass away. As Sunday’s Collect expresses it, in that Word we have, we possess the blessed hope of everlasting life. May the Lord of Life fill our hearts and minds with that wonderful certainty.
A Bible memory verse: Luke xxi,
“Wherefore receive ye one another, as Christ also received us to the glory of God.”
Wednesdays: Evening Prayer 5:45, Low Mass 6pm, and Bible study 6:45 on the Gospel of St. John (picking up at John 3:1)
Next Sunday December 13th, Third Sunday in Advent (Rose Sunday), Morning Prayer at 9:30am; Choral Mass at 11am.
Please note that our Christmas Eve Choral Mass will begin at 6pm on Thursday 24 December. There will be a Low Mass Christmas Day at 10am.
2010 Pledge Drive begins. You should all have received your Pledge letters and forms by now by snail or email. Please read, pray, and let us know on the enclosed form what God has led you to provide for St. Ann Chapel in 2010. Please return them soonest. Extra letters and forms are available if desired.